IN NEED OF A BATH

The summer is definitely here with muggy evenings and sun-burn-tastic mornings for the club’s members to run in. Sweaty is the phrase that springs to mind when remembering the past week’s running!

The week’s action started with the fourth round of the Mickey Edwards series. There were many tired legs after the previous weekend’s endurance however that didn’t stop 15 runners improving on their base-line times:
Don Welsh had the largest improvement, knocking 1:23 off of expectation. He was the first home to the village hall. Andrew White followed with an improvement of 1:22; and third home was Paul Blackwell, improving by 1:08. John Ferdinand was 57 seconds faster than previous and was chased home by Magdalena Komorowska who ran a personal best of 25:00 and improved by 43 seconds.
David Iddon knocked 31 seconds off of his baseline whilst both Nick Goodman and Kevin James bagged improvements of 17 seconds. A personal best came for Deborah Cubberley with a time of 24:55 and an improvement of 14 seconds. Colin Farmer was 11 seconds faster than previous, followed closely by Amy Young and Rob Thorpe who improved by eight seconds a piece. Caroline Searle had a nearly PB with a time of 25:24 (six seconds faster than baseline); Ryan Day beat his previous time by four seconds and Michael Oates won the consistency prize with a time exactly equal to his baseline time of 23:37.

The Stowmarket Friday 5, a five-mile road race, was held in the heat of Friday evening. Mark Ross is a keen participant over the five mile distance and completed the race in 38:37. Hien Hoang followed him home in 42:28; Alison Clarke in 50:29; and John Bush finished in 50:45. The next in the Friday 5 series is Framlingham this week.

Also in the five-mile category was the Maisie Fun Run on Sunday. In memory of Maisie, who sadly passed away from Cancer in 2014 aged 4, Maisie’s parents stage a five-mile fun run along Maisie’s favourite place, Clacton Seafront. Maisie also loved biscuits so there are plenty of those along the route as well. Many from the club attended the fun run, including friend of Maisie’s family Brian Telford who helps put the run on each year.

Slightly less local was Helsinki half marathon. The course loops around some of the Finnish capital’s landmarks including the marina so is a great opportunity for sight seeing. GBRC had four tourists traveling the 13.1 mile course: for the ladies was Chusa Bautista Fructuoso, who finished in a time of 1:52:28. She was followed by Lee Clarkson in 1:57:33; Luke Groves 2:02:24; and John Ferdinand in a time of 2:23:29, which was a personal best for the 13.1 mile distance by over 12 minutes.

On Saturday morning there was GBRC representation at three parkruns: Colchester Castle, Clacton Seafront and Harwich.
At Harwich, Benjamin Ficken finished in a time of 22:31. He was chased home by Kevin James who stopped the clock on 22:51. John Bush followed his Friday 5 activity up with a 5000m run in 30:34 and Sandra James finished the course in 36:42.
At Clacton Seafront Dave Goldsmith was the third finisher with a time of 19:30; only 20 seconds later Ray Baggs finished in 19:50. Emma Wakeling took on the Clacton course for the first time, finishing in 25:40, a time good enough to be third female finisher.
The largest representation was seen at Colchester Castle. Craig Warriner led the way in 18:37. Charlie Keitch, complete with Cassius in the buggy, wove his way to a 21:26 finish and Jake Darkins crossed the line in 22:02. Malcolm Jarvis arrived back at the bandstand shortly after in 22:18; Andy Stephens, resting his legs after two marathons, stopped the clock in 25:07; and completing the line-up for the GBRC gents was Jack Wicks in 29:12. The GBRC ladies at Colchester Castle were Anna Mills in 24:12; Claudia Keitch in 27:54 and Lousie Upston who crossed the line in 31:48.

Also on Saturday morning was the second in the Essex Summer Cross Country 10k series. Frank Gardiner improved on his time from the first race, finishing this one in 51:41; over 90 seconds faster. Meera Rajoo-Oakley also ran, and was going well until a navigational error found her crossing a river wandering about in the woods and accidentally cutting the course. Tragically her Garmin-predicted finish time would have seen her improve by over 2 minutes and 3 positions. However currently she is sitting with a fake 10k personal best time of 43:45 awaiting some sort of adjustment (probably a 3 minute addition).

Junior parkrun had seven young runners form GBRC out on the 2000m course. Personal best runs were achieved by Megan Hughes in 9:49; Angel Jasper in 9:54; and Rufus Keitch in 11:21. Caitlyn Hughes finished in 12:24; Isabella Jones in 15:45; Chloe Iddon in 16:02 and Mia Iddon in 20:41.

At the other end of the scale in terms of distance was the challenge undertaken by Deborah Cubberley and Paul Hollidge. Travelling southwards from Chipping Camden to Bath, the pair ran the Cotswold way over four days. Their total running time was just over 24 hours; with each day starting at 8:45 and the rules stating they must check in at the next camp site by 6pm. Other features of the run are the 60+ pubs that one can stop at along the way (just make sure to be checked in by 6pm!) and the benefit of the Hug Bus in case you need to drop out mid-way thorugh a day.
Both Cubberley and Hollidge appear to have thoroughly enjoyed their 102+ mile adventure in the Cotswolds and they completed the trip with champagne and a bit of shopping once in Bath.